Oh how Mars Needs more than just Moms. Disney’s latest animated endeavor, Mars Needs Moms, hits theaters this weekend and while it was better than I expected, it’s still nothing to get really excited about.
With a voice cast led by Seth Greene, Joan Cusack, and Dan Fogler, Mars Needs Moms is nothing more than Disney’s monthly cash cow that exists only to fill the Disney void until its more prominent and anticipation worthy pictures are released (i.e. Pirates of the Caribbean and Cars 2)
Having no desire to originally see the film, I went in with the premonition that it would be horrible on all accounts. I had only seen one trailer and it was enough to put me off completely. But then I received an invitation for a screening and I released my stronghold on my personal thoughts on the film. I opened my mind and replaced it with that of a child. To say the least, the movie wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.
The plot of Mars Needs Moms is simple: Mars has gone away with using their own females as mothers and so to take care of the babies they search for a caring but disciplined mother on Earth and extract her skills and are transferred to robots who are then responsible for the babies. Milo’s (Green) mom has been chosen by the aliens, right after he finished an argument with her, and as he runs out after her he gets stuck on the spaceship and is taken hostage. Gibble, the only other human on Mars, saves Milo and together they embark on an adventure to save Milo’s mom, with help from a young hippy Alien and a few tribal alien men.
I saw the film in IMAX 3D and thought it was pretty impressive (the IMAX part not the 3D). I don’t go to see many movies in IMAX unless it deserves it (i.e. 300) but this did look pretty good on the big screen. I thought the motion capture was excellent and you’ll come to appreciate it when you get to the credits and they show clips of the actors actually filming the scenes in a big white warehouse strapped with all the equipment. And while the mo-cap was good, it still didn’t prevent me from getting annoyed with the actual style of animation. I felt as if I was watching a bad video game trailer, and I hate bad video game trailers (especially ones where the game footage looks like crap). As for the 3D it wasn’t really needed, some depth was added to certain scenes and it looked good during the scenes where people/objects were falling and that’s about it.
As for the story, it was mehh; highly predictable, but kind of cute for the kids. I have an appreciation for children’s films and while I didn’t happen to laugh that much, and also found a few points of the movie a tad ridiculous, I could completely understand if the little ones enjoy this pic. I mean, let’s face it, the movie was made for them and maybe even with some small hope that the parents would enjoy too. I think it was the over the top cheesy dialogue that truly did me in.
One disclaimer, don’t expect anything to be realistic. I don’t think the filmmakers took any concept of science and actually applied it to this film because if they did, Milo would have probably died about 40 times throughout the movie, it was actually funny to watch. There is one shocking moment in the film but then predictability kicks and it ends that moment real quick.
As for the directing, it was just about average. Simon Wells directed it and while I originally didn’t know the name, I am quite familiar with some of his better family films like Balto, The Prince of Egypt, and one of my childhood favorites, We’re Back! A Dinosaur Story. The man has stuck to what he is good at and so I’ll be really curious to hear what the response are from the kids, from the ones I’ve heard from so far the result is that they did like the movie.
Mars Needs Moms is nowhere near as entertaining as a Dreamworks or Pixar film but it gets the job done when you take the youngsters’ point of view. As an adult, you’ll find it cute but nothing more than that and so for that reason I can’t really recommend it to you unless you are a parent. Although I would recommend it over Red Riding Hood since that movie comes out this weekend as well and is supposedly miserable on all accounts—even with Gary Oldman in it.
Rating: A childish ride that’s cute enough for its intended audience (4.5/10)
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